Ordinary Life in Russia

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Random Russian Idiom

ХОЖДЕНИЕ ПО МУКАМ

(lit.)

a series of trying experiences in life, one following another: a (one) long ordeal

(going through) purgatory

the Road to Calvary < From the ancient Christian belief reflected in the Old Russian apocryphal text “Descent of the Virgin into Hell” («Хождение Богородицы по мукам», 12th cent), that the souls of the deceased endure forty days of torment immediately after death. The phrase came into widespread use after the publication of a trilogy under the same title by Aleksei Tolstoi (1921-41), translated into English as “Road to Calvary”.

501 Russian Verbs (Barron’s Foreign Language Guides)

Here is a fine quick-reference source for language students, teachers, and translators. The 501 most commonly used Russian verbs are listed in table form, one verb per page, and conjugated in all tenses, identified by English infinitive forms. Verbs are both regular and irregular, and are presented alphabetically for easy reference in the Cyrillic alphabet. Added material related to verbs and verb usage is also presented, including lists of hundreds more regular verbs, idiomatic verb usage, and more.

750 Russian Verbs and Their Uses

“750 Russian Verbs and Their Uses” gives you the key to a living language - verbs in context.
Verbs give speech power and movement. Russian verbs have subtleties that usually can be appreciated only after years of study and conversation with native speakers. “750 Russian Verbs and Their Uses” gives you all the correct variations and adds immediately to your command of the language.
Correct usages are illustrated in common phrases and idioms, and close attention is paid to verb aspect - a special concern to students of Russian. Perfect for students or for businesspeople who are working to develop one of the world’s most exciting commercial markets, here is the book that will help you understand and express yourself in an important and intricate tongue.

A Comprehensive Russian Grammar

“A Comprehensive Russian Grammar” provides a definitive guide to current Russian usage, taking many of its examples from the press and contemporary literary sources. Since it was first published in 1992, the book has become the standard reference work for students and professionals alike and is used as the basis for Russian language teaching across the English-speaking world.
The new edition draws on feedback from users of the first edition to build on its existing strengths. Sections dealing with all parts of speech have been modified or supplemented, with pronunciation, the noun, the adjective, the verb and the preposition most affected. There are entirely new substantial sections on word formation in the Russian noun. Elements of post-Soviet vocabulary have been introduced to reflect changes in usage. The Second Edition also contains an expanded bibliography and a glossary of linguistic terms.

A Concise History of the Russian Revolution

The author, Richard Pipes, has condensed his two-volume opus, “The Russian Revolution” and “Russia Under the Bolsheviks”, into a single readable volume. Forcefully showing why the 70-year-old Communist experiment failed, he provides the nonacademic reader with accurate historical events in a highly readable format. Only a minor flaw in the fourth chapter, where he fails to explain who the Mensheviks were until 30 pages later in the next chapter, mars this excellent book. The approach parallels Dominic Lieven’s contemporary volume “Nicholas II” but is better organized and more complete. The last chapter does a fine job of summing up the revolution and adds a curious comparison between Bolshevik and Tsarist Russia. Ultimately, Pipes shows how the seeds of destruction of communism were planted at its inception in 1917. Recommended for public, academic, and school libraries.

A Dog’s Heart: An Appalling Story by Mikhail Bulgakov

This hilarious, brilliantly inventive novel by the author of “The Master and Margarita” tells a surreal of a renowned Moscow doctor who befriends a stray dog named Sharik and performs on it a human transplant - with disastrous consequences. Thanks to the doctor’s skills Sharik is transformed into a lecherous, vulgar man who spouts Engels and inevitably finds his niche in the bureaucracy as the government official in charge of purging the city of cats. The “dog” escapes, wreaking havoc for the professor and possibly for humanity.
The story is a grimly comic allegory of the Russian Revolution.

A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov

“A Hero Of Our Time” (1839) is the only novel written by one of Russia’s greatest Romantic poets, Mikhail Lermontov - considered by many to be the Russian counterpart of Lord Byron - who died in a duel at the age of 26, leaving behind an unforgettable literary legacy.
This beloved classic has everything for the modern reader - dangerous liaisons, elegant psychological complexity, dark passion, emotional tension, romantic duels and deception, fiery action in the Caucasus, beautiful and exotic women with flair… And the sexiest Byronic anti-hero in all of Russian literature.

A History of Russian Architecture

Sweeping from masonry churches of Kievan Rus to the prefabricated, industrialized buildings of the post-Stalinist era, this detailed, magnificently illustrated history firmly places Russian architecture in a cultural context.
Brumfield, a professor of Slavic languages at Tulane University, traces an “architecture of national survival’ from late medieval votive churches, which reflected a succession of tzars’ suspicion of Western culture, through Peter the Great’s pragmatic adaptation of northern baroque, to 1930s totalitarian pseudoclassicism. He examines Russia’s creative assimilation of foreign influences into distinctive forms, whether in neoclassical palaces, festive polychrome churches with gilded onion domes, log houses, the eclectic “style moderne” of Moscow’s Hotel Metropole or the international modernism of 1920s constructivists.

A History of Russian Music: From Kamarinskaya to Babi Yar

Francis Maes’ comprehensive and imaginative book introduces the general public to the scholarly debate that has revolutionized Russian music history over the past two decades. Based on the most recent critical literature, “A History of Russian Music” summarizes the new view of Russian music and provides a solid overview of the relationships between artistic movements and political ideas. The revision of Russian music history may count as one of the most significant achievements of recent musicology. The Western view used to be largely based on the ideas of Vladimir Stasov, a friend and confidant of leading nineteenth-century Russian composers who was more a propagandist than a historian. With the deconstruction of Stasov’s interpretation, stereotyped views have been replaced by a fuller understanding of the conditions and the context in which composers such as Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, and Stravinsky created their oeuvres.
Even the more recent history of Soviet music, in particular the achievement of Dmitry Shostakovich, is being assessed on new documentary grounds. A more complex conception of Russian music develops as Maes explores the cultural and historical milieu from which great works have emerged. Questioning and re-examining traditional views, the author considers the personal development of composers, the relationship of art to social and political ideals in Russia, and the ideologies behind musical research.

A Reference Grammar of Russian

“A Reference Grammar of Russian” describes and systematizes all aspects of the grammar of Russian: the patterns of orthography, sounds, inflection, syntax, tense-aspect-mood, word order, and intonation. It is especially concerned with the meaning of combinations of words (constructions). The core concept is that of the predicate history: a record of the states of entities through time and across possibilities.
Using predicate histories, the book presents an integrated account of the semantics of verbs, nouns, case, and aspect. More attention is paid to syntax than in any other grammars of Russian written in English or in other languages of Western Europe. Alan Timberlake refers to the literature on variation and trends in development, and makes use of contemporary data from the internet. This book will appeal to students, scholars and language professionals interested in Russian.

A Russian Grammar Workbook

Building on the success of his widely-acclaimed textbook, “A Comprehensive Russian Grammar”, the author provides a workbook for all English-speaking students of Russian. This book is designed to be used both as a companion volume to the reference grammar, and independently. Exercises range from substitution drills and multiple choice to grammatical quizzes and translation exercises, with every important grammatical point illustrated and explored. The large-format workbook includes a key for students working on their own and suggestions for following up particularly difficult areas in more detail. “A Russian Grammar Workbook” offers a structured and stimulating approach to the study of Russian for learners at all levels.

A Taste of Russia: A Cookbook of Russian Hospitality

A definitive modern cookbook on Russian cuisine, “A Taste of Russia” layers superbly researched recipes with informative essays on the dishes’ rich historical and cultural context. With over 200 recipes on everything from borsch to blini, from Salmon Coulbiac to Beef Stew, from Marinated Mushrooms to Black Bread, Goldstein shows off the best that Russian cooking has to offer.

Advanced Russian Through History (CD included)

“Advanced Russian Through History” is a Russian reader for intermediate and advanced students of Russian and heritage learners of Russian. The book consists of 36 chapters focusing on the history of Russia, from Kievan Rus’ to the post-Soviet era. Each chapter features a written text, a brief lecture on the accompanying CD-ROM, and web-based learning tasks designed to promote students’ abilities to understand and produce argument in the style of scholarly discourse, both in speech and in writing.

Afghanistan: A Russian Soldier’s Story

Drafted into the Soviet Army in April 1984 and sent at the age of 19 to serve in Afghanistan as a minesweeper, Vladislav Tamarov turned in secret to the pen and the camera to chronicle his 621 days of war. Photographs depicting the haunted faces of both soldiers and civilians, the country’s ragged yet beautiful mountain terrain, and the banality of daily life between missions and interspersed with Tamarov’s unsentimental but passionate prose, in which he reveals his growing disorientation and assails his government’s folly for engaging in a campaign that has been widely dubbed “the Soviet Vietnam.”
A powerful example of the photo essay, “Afghanistan: A Russian Soldier’s Story” presents a powerful portrait of a traumatic war. With images and words bursting with insight, anger, and beauty, Tamarov proves himself a poet of both the word and the image in this moving account.

An Anthology Of Russian Literature From Earliest Writings To Modern Fiction

Russia has a rich, huge, unwieldy cultural tradition. How to engage it? This pathbreaking reader was designed to respond to that challenge. The literary works selected for inclusion in this anthology introduce the core cultural and historical themes of Russian civilization. Each text has resonance throughout the arts - in Rublev’s icons, Meyerhold’s theater, Mousorgsky’s operas, Prokofiev’s symphonies, Fokine’s choreography, and Kandinsky’s paintings. They are supported by introductions, helpful annotations, bibliographies of resources, and a companion multimedia CD that brings the anthology’s cultural references to life.

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

One of the greatest and worldwide recognized Tolstoy’s novels, translated into numerous languages and made various film versions of.
“Anna Karenina” tells of the doomed love affair between the sensuous and rebellious Anna and the dashing officer, Count Vronsky. Tragedy unfolds as Anna rejects her passionless marriage and must endure the hypocrisies of society. Set against a vast and richly textured canvas of nineteenth-century Russia, the novel’s seven major characters create a dynamic imbalance, playing out the contrasts of city and country life and all the variations on love and family happiness.
While previous versions have softened the robust, and sometimes shocking, quality of Tolstoy’s writing, Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky have produced a translation true to his powerful voice. This award-winning team’s authoritative edition also includes an illuminating introduction and explanatory notes. Beautiful, vigorous, and eminently readable, this “Anna Karenina” will be the definitive text for generations to come.

Anton Chekhov’s Short Stories

This collection of thirty-four stories by the Russian dramatist and short story master span the author’s creative career, beginning with early sketches and including major stories often anthologized such as “Ward No. 6” and “The Lady with the Little Dog”. His subjects are doctors, peasants, petty officials, ferrymen, monks, nannies, soldiers, patients, artists, society folks. His topics are as broad - fidelity, integrity, meaning, duty, survival, faith, class. There are stories about a medical student and an artist whose servant is almost beneath notice but is the story’s subject; a woman who marries a doctor but squanders her life searching for a celebrity among her artist friends who might be a hero; a coffin maker and musician who is a tragic bully but lives to bestow a gift on a victim of his bullying; and stories about a factory heir who is ill and might never survive to inherit her factory; a pair of lovers who court despite the displeasure of the woman’s older sibling.
They are all artful, disciplined stories with little that appears false or contrived. Reading this selection, it is easy to see why modern short story writers view him not just as an influence, but a continuing resource for pleasure, insight, and the study of the craft of storytelling.

Barron’s Russian Vocabulary

Find the word you need in Russian quickly and easily!
Nearly 8,000 words listed by category with their Russian equivalents and pronunciations. Words are divided into several different categories and listed alphabetically within each category: • numbers and math concepts; • time and dates; • the weather; • colors; • family and friends; • gender; • sensory perception; • trees and other vegetation; • animals; • greetings and social expressions; • using the telephone; • food; • shopping; • science and technology; • travel; • dealing with emergencies; • school and work situations; • computers and electronics; • finance; • pop culture terms; • and more.
Plus… An A-to-Z English-Russian Word Finder.

Barron’s Traveler’s Language Guide - Russian

Find the right words and phrases for all travel situations, plus tips on enjoying an active and creative vacation, traveling with children, and traveling if you are physically handicapped.
Words, phrases and information on food and dining, the Russian people and their culture, renting a car, getting medical help in cases of illness or accident, and much more. Filled with cross-cultural tips Features a Russian-English and English-Russian glossary plus a brief overview of Russian grammar. Color photos and color-coded pages give you quick reference to specific topics.

Basic Russian: A Grammar and Workbook

“A Grammar and Workbook” comprises an accessible reference grammar and related exercises in a single volume. It introduces Russian people and culture through the medium of the language used today, covering the core material which students would expect to encounter in their first year of learning Russian. Each of the 40 units presents one or more related grammar topics, illustrated by examples which serve as models for the wide-ranging and varied exercises which follow. These exercises enable the student to master the relevant grammar points.
“Basic Russian” is suitable for independent study and for class use. The book includes exercises reflecting contemporary spoken Russian; grammar tables for easy reference; full key to the exercises; glossary of all Russian words featured. “Basic Russian: A Grammar and Workbook” is the ideal reference and practice book for the student with some knowledge of the language.

Berlitz Russian Book & CD

With hundreds of travel-related expressions, including greetings, questions, numbers and more, the “Berlitz Phrase Book and CD” offers business and leisure travelers key words and phrases needed for a trip abroad. In print and audio, its up-to-date, relevant content makes the “Berlitz Phrase Book and CD” an essential tool for today’s travelers. Each foreign language phrase is repeated - slowly at first and then at normal speed - so learners can build confidence.
Full-colour photographs throughout help explain visually the currency, cash machines, ticket machines, motoring signs and much more. The CD features more than 3,000 key travel survival words and phrases so you can hear and practise the language. It is compatible with PC, iPod and MP3 devices.

Chronicle of the Russian Tsars

This chronicle documents the lives of Tsars famous and infamous in a lively series of biographical portraits stretching from the late 15th to the early 20th centuries. With its comprehensive timelines, datafiles, quotations and stunning illustrations, “Chronicle of the Russian Tsars” is at once an absorbing narrative history and an essential work of reference that brings to life a powerful empire and distinctive civilization whose impact on the history of Europe and the world is immeasurable.

Collins Russian Concise Dictionary

“Harper-Collins Russian Concise Dictionary” is targeted to first-year college language students and advanced high school students. Economically priced and packaged in an easy-to-carry paperback format, this dictionary is a best buy on a crowded shelf. The dictionary includes a 250 page grammatical reference section at the back, making it a 2-in-1 reference source especially useful to language students.

Colloquial Russian 2: The Next Step in Language Learning

Do you know Russian already and want to go a stage further? If you’re planning a visit to Russia, need to brush up your Italian for work, or are simply doing a course, “Colloquial Russian 2” is the ideal way to refresh your knowledge of the language and to extend your skills. “Colloquial Russian 2” is designed to help those involved in self-study; structured to give you the opportunity to listen to and read lots of modern, everyday Russian, it has also been developed to work systematically on reinforcing and extending your grasp of Russian grammar and vocabulary. Key features of “Colloquial Russian 2” include:
* Revision material to help consolidate and build up your basics;
* A wide range of contemporary authentic documents, both written and audio.
* Lots of spoken and written exercises in each unit;
* Highlighted key structures and phrases, a Grammar reference and detailed answer keys;
* A broad range of situations, focusing on day to day life in Russia.
This pack contains the course book 120 minutes of audio material, provided on CDs. Recorded by native speakers, this material will help you perfect your pronunciation and listening skills.

Colloquial Russian: The Complete Course For Beginners

“Colloquial Russian” is easy to use and completely up to date! Specially written by experienced teachers for self-study or class use, the course offers you a step-by step approach to written and spoken Russian. No prior knowledge of the language is required.
What makes this new edition of “Colloquial Russian” your best choice in personal language learning? 1) Interactive - lots of dialogues and exercises for regular practice; 2) Clear - concise grammar notes; 3) Practical - useful vocabulary and pronunciation guide; 4) Complete - including answer key and special reference section. Whether you’re a business traveller, or about to take up a daring challenge in adventure tourism; you may be studying to teach or even looking forward to a holiday - if you’d like to get up and running with Russian, this rewarding course will take you from complete beginner to confidently putting your language skills to use in a wide range of everyday situations.
This pack contains the book and 120 minutes of audio material recorded on CDs. These complement the book and will help you with your pronunciation and listening skills.

Complete Russian with Two Audio CDs: A Teach Yourself Guide

It’s easy to teach yourself Russian!
“Complete Russian with Two Audio CDs: A Teach Yourself Guide” provides you with a clear and comprehensive approach to Russian, so you can progress quickly from the basics to understanding, speaking, and writing Russian with confidence.
Within each of the 20 thematic chapters, important language structures are introduced through life-like dialogues.You’ll learn grammar in a gradual manner so you won’t be overwhelmed by this tricky subject. Exercises accompany the texts and reinforce learning in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. This program also features current cultural information boxes that reflect recent changes in society.
The accompanying audio CDs include audio exercises - performed by native speakers - that reinforce communicative skills.

Conversational Russian: In 20 Lessons (Cortina Method)

Includes:
- Guide to pronunciation: simple phonetics based on English spelling
- 20 conversational lessons: useful vocabularies; interesting conversations with pronunciation and helpful footnotes
- Cultural information: panorama of Russian life and literature
- Complete reference grammar: clear explanations of rules of grammar and structure of the language
- Bilingual dictionary: all useful words you need to know
Special offer:
- High quality sound
- Compact and portable
- Useful conversations
- Easy to use at home, in your car, or wherever you go.

The 16-lesson (8 CDs) Conversational Course gives customers the first half of the incredibly effective and efficient, world-famous Pimsleur Comprehensive Program. Customers will love the experience of acquiring the essential grammar and vocabulary of Russian during the spoken practice sessions. It is this ease of language acquisition that makes the full Comprehensive Pimsleur Program so popular and successful for adult language learners.

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Through the story of the brilliant but conflicted young Raskolnikov and the murder he commits, Fyodor Dostoevsky explores the theme of redemption through suffering. “Crime and Punishment” put Dostoevsky at the forefront of Russian writers when it appeared in 1866 and is now one of the most famous and influential novels in world literature.
The poverty-stricken Raskolnikov, a talented student, devises a theory about extraordinary men being above the law, since in their brilliance they think new thoughts and so contribute to society. He then sets out to prove his theory by murdering a vile, cynical old pawnbroker and her sister. The act brings Raskolnikov into contact with his own buried conscience and with two characters the deeply religious Sonia, who has endured great suffering, and Porfiry, the intelligent and discerning official who is charged with investigating the murder both of whom compel Raskolnikov to feel the split in his nature. Dostoevsky provides readers with a suspenseful, penetrating psychological analysis that goes beyond the crime which in the course of the novel demands drastic punishment to reveal something about the human condition: The more we intellectualize, the more imprisoned we become.

Dead Souls: A Novel by Nikolai Vasilevich Gogol

Since its publication in 1842, “Dead Souls” has been celebrated as a supremely realistic portrait of provincial Russian life and as a splendidly exaggerated tale; as a paean to the Russian spirit and as a remorseless satire of imperial Russian venality, vulgarity, and pomp. As Gogol’s wily antihero, Chichikov, combs the back country wheeling and dealing for “dead souls” - deceased serfs who still represent money to anyone sharp enough to trade in them - we are introduced to a Dickensian cast of peasants, landowners, and conniving petty officials, few of whom can resist the seductive illogic of Chichikov’s proposition.
This lively, idiomatic English version by the award-winning translators Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky makes accessible the full extent of the novel’s lyricism, sulphurous humor, and delight in human oddity and error.

Dermo!: The Real Russian Tolstoy Never Used

Not even Tolstoy would dare use the eyebrow-raising Russian you’ll find in this wickedly humorous language guide by one of Russia’s bestselling novelists today. Whether you’re traveling to Russia for the first time or you are a student of the language, this indispensable book is your entree to the real and new Russian that has never been taught.
You’ll be armored with triple-decker curses and insults, endearments and expressions for situations ranging from high-level business meetings to cocktail parties to sexual encounters. Filled with words, idioms, and vulgarisms you won’t learn in a classroom, plus twenty hilarious line drawings and a complete index to vital expletives, Dermo! will provide you with the uncensored answers to the questions you always wanted to know…but no translator would ever tell you!